This is Laxman Rao, an author-cum-tea seller based in India’s capital city of New Delhi. “I was born in 1952 in a village called Amravati. I was an avid reader of author novelist and screenwriter Gulshan Nanda. He was my first inspiration,” says Rao. Rao came to Delhi hoping to become a popular writer. Today, he believes he has achieved that. He has authored 25 books. Time management “I am good at time management. I read and write for around five hours, daily, after which ...

Writers, scholars and students have frequently visited this street bookstore in Anarkali market in Pakistan’s Lahore over the years. It has also been source of livelihood for families associated with this business. “Many legendary writers such as Ashfaq Ahmed, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Munir Niazi and Manto used to visit this place. Even now young writers come often because of which our markets are valued more,” says book seller Sheikh Abdul Haq. Four generations of Sheikh Abdul Haq has ...

There is no point in talking about the end of the paper book anymore. The eventual extinction of paper is obvious. Publishers now realize the paper book is coming to an end, and those who are smart are beginning to make adjustments accordingly.The end of the paper book does not mean that it will disappear suddenly or that books will no longer be printed. Like others, I consider paper books to be more serious and there is a certain element of pleasure in buying a paper book. There is something ...

“History will be kind to me for I intend to write it,” Winston Churchill once said. As a modern day South Asian, who has grown up and lived most of his life in the Middle East, I always felt as history was unkind to my region and culture. It was always being presented to me from the perspective of people from another region far away from my geographical and cultural shores. Since childhood, I have been an avid reader of history books and historical fiction. History was a subject very ...

“What has been so incredible for me is how many world class speakers are also writers and these are the movers and shakers of government policy, of trips to Mars, you name it, they are here”. This is how Isobel Abulhoul, the CEO and Trustee of Emirates Literature Foundation and Festival Director, described the World Government Summit in Dubai last week, speaking exclusively to Al Arabiya English. As the Emirates Festival of Literature is just round the corner, she understandably got ...

As soon as my husband and I found out we were pregnant with our daughter Samya, who was born last March, we knew we wanted to raise her to speak Arabic. Since my husband is a midwestern from Kansas who didn’t know what zaatar was and refused to eat plain yogurt until he met me, we decided we were going to follow the OPOL method. One parent one language. I would speak to her in Arabic and my husband would speak to her in English. (Check back with me in two years to see if it works!) ...

Ghareeb al-Sheikh is a 50-year-old Egyptian citizen. He came up with an idea to put a home library in the street and in front of his small kiosk where he offered his books for free borrowing, in order to educate young people and encourage them to read. Ghareeb works as a newspapers salesman in the Dekheila area of Alexandria. He told Al Arabiya that he has a library of about 390 books. After reading most of it, he felt that it should be available to others to benefit from his books and enjoy ...

The Sharjah International Book Fair and the inauguration of the Louvre Abu Dhabi have thrilled us in the UAE. The Book Fair displays publications, which delve into the details of those who are flawed. It gives them wings and allows them to fly toward the sun.The exhibition is thus a real place for creative men who are fond of words. Meanwhile, the Louvre museum brought us the most significant works of art and historical artifacts from the Louvre in Paris.In order to live, books and art are as ...

Young Emirati author and self-development coach Hanan al- Samak put all her positive thoughts in her book “Hayatak” (Your Life). Hanan spoke to Al Arabiya about how to be positive and embrace positivity in one’s life. She advocates connecting positivity to being realistic. Positivity is not synonymous to “smiling or having a smiley face,” she said. In her interview with Al Arabiya, Hanan said: “We do not live in an ideal world so to be positive we have ...